Editorial Review:

Item Description:
Philips HDRW720 DVD Recorder and Hard Disc Drive - The concept is to record for today on the Hard Disk storage drive then, if you want to save the recording forever, preserve it by recording it on the integrated DVD recorder. Channel Blaster - The channel blaster is a special accessory that lets a DVD Recorder control cable boxes. It sends infra-red remote control commands in order to switch the set top box on and select the correct channel FlexTime - With FlexTime you can watch a program while it's still being recorded, thanks to the extreme speed of a Hard Disk. You can also watch a different progam from the Hard Disk while it's recording something else A very large built-in memory records the program on screen when you press the pause button. When it suits you, you can resume the program from the moment you pressed Â?pause' as if you're watching a live program TV Guide On Screen is an Interactive Program Guide - a free guide that shows what's on TV for the next couple of days and lets you program the timer of the DVD Recorder with the push of a button Ports - 4-pin iLink IEEE1394 / S-Video in/out / A/V Composite in/out / Component Video in/out / Coax and Optical Digital Audio out / G-Link for Channel Blaster DVD Recorder can also play DVD-R - DVD-RW - CDR/RW - MP3 CD - Audio CD - Video CD - Picture CD English, French, Spanish on-screen programmable menu display Remote

Amazon.com Item Description:
The Philips HDRW720 DVD recorder/hard disk combination lets you adjust your TV viewing to suit your everyday life. You'll have the option to record up to a staggering 192 hours--8 straight days--of television directly to the built-in 120 GB hard-disk drive (HDD) to watch and delete programs at your leisure. Or you can save programs to DVD for life. Your choice. The HDRW720 also offers the easy-to-use TV Guide onscreen electronic program guide (EPG) so you can just point and click to record your favorite programs.

Viewed programs are automatically stored on the adjustable 6-hour HDD buffer, from which you can retrieve them, watch them again, transfer them to the hard drive, or simply record them onto a DVD+R/+RW disc. A feature called FlexTime lets you watch the beginning of a program while it's still being recorded. And, with the touch of a button, high-speed archiving will copy a recording from the hard disk to recordable media. Thanks to Instant Replay, you can immediately repeat exciting or memorable TV moments at the press of just one button.

You can also use the HDRW720 like a traditional VCR, burning televised programs directly to disc using helpful VCR Plus+ programming data. A DVD recorder is perfect, of course, for archiving your home videos, and the HDRW720 features a front-panel i.Link digital-video connection for easy DV camcorder hookup, perfect copies, and 2-way camera control.

Recording functions include safe record, one-touch record (OTR), track append, track divide, automatic/manual chapter marker insertion, Smart Chaptering, favorite scene selection, and Selectable Index Pictures.

The HDRW720 is also a first-rate DVD player, featuring progressive-scan video outputs, Dolby Digital and DTS 5.1-channel surround sound passthrough, MP3 CD playback (CD-R/CD-RW), and compatibility with most DVD media (including video-mode DVD-R and DVD-RW).

Whether your living room is currently home to an HDTV or you're merely thinking of 'someday,' the HDRW720 will deliver the full potential of your DVDs. Progressive scanning, referred to as 480p for the number of horizontal lines that compose the video image, creates a picture using twice the scan lines of a conventional DVD picture, giving you higher resolution and sharper images while eliminating nearly all motion artifacts.

Top-of-the-line component-video inputs and outputs help minimize digital and line-scan artifacts on compatible advanced televisions, while composite-video, S-video, and RF coaxial video inputs and outputs bring compatibility with nearly any video component and television monitor. Audio inputs consist of 2-channel analog jacks.

Two sets of left/right analog-audio outputs channel audio to Dolby Pro Logic receivers and stereo televisions. Both Dolby Digital and DTS 5.1-channel surround-sound signals can be routed through the player's digital-audio outputs (1 each of RCA coaxial and Toslink optical) for direct connection to a full-featured audio/video receiver.

What's in the Box
DVD recorder/hard disk, a universal remote control, remote batteries, a channel blaster (IR extender cable), a blank DVD+RW disc, an AC power cable, a composite-video cable, a stereo audio cable, a coaxial RF antenna cable, an S-video cable, a component-video cable, a digital-audio coaxial cable, a user's manual, and warranty information.

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Rating: - * nice features but ultimately unreliable ... When it works, it's great, but operation (esp. with TV Guide feed) is extremely unstable. Will tend to reset, hang, lose TV Guide channel/program information, "forget" to record programmed shows, forget to stop at the end of a recorded program, and probably a few other things that I forget because they didn't quite happen frequently enough. This is clearly a prematurely released product. If had a dollar for every time this box crashed, it would have earned its purchase price back long ago. Rating: - * I want one that works ... This is a great idea if it would work better. Is there a better model out there? Rating: - * Philips HDRW720 DVD recorder with 120 GB Hard Drive ... The DVR arrived dead out of the box. I was refunded my purchase price but lost the $20 I paid for shipping plus the $9 it cost to return the unit. I purchased Toshiba RD XS55 DVR units with 250 GB hard drives from another source and they worked without problems. I would never try any Philips products again. Rating: - * Very poor Quality image lower than my old VCR ... I have one phillips dvd recorder and player with hard drive, it was very expensive , but is a very bad appliance here you have the reasons to avoid it : 1) The quality of the image is poor , even when it is reading a dvd it might be similar to a VCR. 2)I tried record all my personal stuff ( which I had in VHS) to dvds but the quality I got is very poor, I got also a lot of digital vibration on the images, it is very annoying to watch , it is much better to see the all VHS. 3)Problems with the remomte control. To use the remote control I have to point the tip of the control to the DVD I have to be very careful or it won t work , another possibilty is to come closer and then use the remote control , it does not make any sence . 4) A little problems functionality : it doesn t have an eject button , it the remote control so you have to come to the appliance each time you want to eject the discs. 5) It is too expensive , I paid less than 50 dollars for my second dvd and it works much better ( from every point of view ) the phillips dvd should not cost more than 120 only because of the hard drive . I hope do not not make the same mistake I did. regards Rating: - * Good idea.. just doesn't work ... I bought a refurbished unit primarily so I can recode video from my DV camcorder to DVD. The older Philips like this one will write the recording date and time to the DVD as subtitles. This is a great idea. I don't know how people can save their videos without this feature. Newer Philips don't do it anymore. Once we got it, I started liking the idea of using it as a hard drive recorder. The 120gig drive has plenty of room for lots of stuff. Recording quality is very good, I even think the 8hr mode is watchable, but you don't need it cause you have so much room. The idea of the TV guide is great. Get free listings, just highlite the show you want and its scheduled to record. The recording even saves the description of that episode. Everything sounds good right? Just one problem. IT DOESN'T WORK! I have it scheduled to record 4 shows a day. I don't think it has every properly recorder the 4 shows. It will completely miss some recordings, sometimes record part of a show, often start recording but forget to stop and record almost 6 hours of whatever. It appears that it crashes frequently. When it crashes while recording a show, red lights light up around the DVD recorder and power switch then it powers off. I haven't figured out anyway for it to work. I tried unsetting the TV guide, I tried setting explicit times to record, I tried setting the time manually. All for naught. It crashes. I wish I could find some magic hint on the internet to help make it more reliable. I "assume" its a software problem, not a hardware problem. Oh, and the usability is amazingly bad. Take whatever function and you'd never guess how unnatural an interface they came up with. Worst is the time buffer. Too many issues to describe, but again I think its related to problems with the TV guide and poor software. If it worked, maybe it wouldn't be so bad.